NAC, Tuesday 17th June.

 After last month's adventure I made the trip to the local hill to do some more 1296MHz activity.

The hill is 80m (250ft)high and has an unobstructed view for a few 10s of km.

As before, I was running 10W SSB/FM/CW and a 12 element Yagi antenna. Not a big setup, 

Everything was transported from the parking place to the top, distance to walk, about 400-500m, and steep uphill, bit I can do it alone if necessary.

If the weather behaves well, I might also go up there on a Friday evening where we have a weekly FM-simplex net on 433, 50, 70, 145MHz and 1296MHz was recently added. 10W with a good view should be quite good, especially on 1296. 

I was a bit late in getting ready, so I arrived and was ready to operate about 20 minutes after the test started, and immediately there was a QSO with extremely strong signals from another hill about 25km away. Both hills about 8m ASL, so line-of sight.

I worked the highest number of stations in this test, that I have ever done on 23cm. 

The best distance was SM6UTZ at 307km distance, and a few others were above 100km, so I have no complaints.

My antenna was, as usual, mounted horizontally, and I also worked a Copenhagen station OZ13JK, working with a 3-band vertical, I think about 2-3m above ground. That was an improvement over the test last year, when he was trying, and just making a QSO with a handheld 23cm radio and a small handheld yagi antenna.

I tested the sewtup, listening to beacons, 2 of the LA beacons were heard at about 400km, two Swedish beacons not far from Gothenburg, and the Polish SR1KOL at 370km was heard all evening.

I think there was a bit of a tropo lift, as some signals got stronger later in the evening.This was a good outing, and I expect to try it again when the weather allows.

Some Tropo on 1296MHz.

This is interesting.

The last few days we have had some good tropo over the Baltic.

Yesterday the SR1KOL in JO74TE came through a good deal of the afternoon and evening. It did fade in the late evening, and it may have been there through the night.

Distance from JO65CP is close to 270km. Given that I am using a vertical omnidirectional antenna, I am impressed of the signal coming through.

Today, I started listening in the early afternoon, and it was already there. Through the whole afternoon until writing this about 2230 (2030UTC), the signal has been there consistently. Many times with S5.

I am still impressed. Others around me with horizontal antennas hear it S9 a lot of the time, not surprising.

I checked on the map. It turns out that I have an excellent path from my antenna, sloping down to Koege Bugt, then more than 250km across the Baltic Sea. It may not be so surprising that I have heard this beacon quite often. Only a tiny low lying piece of Sweden (Falsterbo) is "in the way. When I get a horizontal antenna up again, I will monitor this path on a more regular basis.

In another direction I have the DB0VC beacon in JO54IF, I have heard it once or twice with the vertical with a more obstructed path. When I had a small horizontal yagi up about 7m, I heard it regularly at just over 180km.

Portable Work on 1296MHz, Tuesday NAC.

 With a bit of preparation, we went to JO65FH on the Peninsula of Stevns to operate a bit in the 1296MHz Nordic Activity Contest.(NAC).

I had arranged with Jorgen, OZ7TA to go there with our equipment and test out the suitability of the site.

This is the site for an old cold war radar station with a magnificent view over parts of the Baltic, so we had antennas about 42-45m above sea level with good flat land for over distances up to 20km.

I had brought my IC-905 and Jorgen his Langstone project transceiver with a 1296MHz "front end" , i.e. TX power amplifier, RX preamplifier and filter. The Langstone is based on a Pluto SDR and Raspbeery Pi 4 with the appropriate software, and will work from 70MHz to 6GHz - with different "front ends"

I brought the 10GHz transverter for the '905 and a 22dBi horn antenna to make a test of the system. unfortunately the SMA connector broke after setting up the system, so the 10GHz testing was cancelled.

On 23cm we both had extremely strong radar signals. So strong that we suspected breakthrough from a nearby radar. Later we found that many other stations had the same problem, so this was very strong propagation.

We made a few contacts, mostly with very strong stations, the weaker signals were drowning in the radar signals.

One drawback that I had not expected was the connection with the ON4KST chat. Because we had a view over the water to Sweden, the 5G connection switched between OZ and SM, so the connection was broken, almost every time I checked it.

That is how it goes. Every time we go out in the field, there is something new to learn, so let's see if we can do better next time.